An advanced new project for next-gen systems by Quantic Dream, the developer of Fahrenheit.

The team at Paris-based developer Quantic Dream has been responsible for such cult favorites as Omikron: The Nomad Soul (more famous, unfortunately, for featuring David Bowie than for gameplay itself) and last fall's critically acclaimed but financially panned (at least in the US) Indigo Prophecy. If anything, this dev team seems to have their focus squarely aimed at recreating cinematic experiences within gaming. With that in mind, Quantic Dream wheeled out an interactive trailer for E3 that shows off what they've got up their sleeves for their next title, Heavy Rain. There are no details regarding the game itself, but QD has taken it upon itself to digitally capture and real-time render a casting audition for the game.

Heavy Rain: The Casting shows a young actress (played by a real actress, Aurelie Brancilhon) trying out for a role in the game. Thanks to the tinnitus-inducing levels of sound emanating from the giant screen at Sony's booth, no one could hear any of the dialogue. Not that it was necessary. The focus of The Casting firmly lies upon showing off the accurately captured facial expressions and emotions of the actress. The action goes from a white casting room into a re-imaging of the role that she's trying to get.

She walks around a kitchen talking, smiling, and laughing. The camera zooms in on her eyes and shows off their graphic detail before slowly zooming out to show the marks on her face and the movement of skin as she goes from happy and smiling to concerned and stressed. The kitchen looks nearly photorealistic, down to the phone numbers on the refrigerator magnets being faintly visible in the background. The actress suddenly gets upset, and her facial expressions become more and more distressed as she pulls out a gun and cocks it to her head. As she keeps on talking (perhaps threatening to shoot herself), she begins crying, and the tears look almost real enough to wipe off the screen. She then turns the camera toward the screen and fires. With that, the action cuts back from dramatic intensity to the white room where the casting call is being held as the actress smiles again and the audition ends.

All of it sounds a bit trivial and boring in a way to read, but in addition to watching the demo with normal lighting effects, The Casting enables E3 attendees to pick up the controller, and with a press of the L1 or R1 buttons, players can affect the lighting in real time. As she talks, the camera can shift from filtered lighting to a grainy, Silent Hill-style experience to green-tinted night vision. It can also render black and white, sepia tones, and even black light effects on the fly. The result is that Quantic Dream seems to be coming along exceptionally well in their attempts to make their cinematically themed games feel even more like they came from Hollywood rather than France.

Having seen what the Quantic Dream team is working on with the PS3 hardware, we're very excited to see what they're going to ultimately do with Heavy Rain when it releases. One thing's for sure: they've certainly caught our attention with their demo. Could the title be the hit that they aimed for last year with Indigo Prophecy? We'll keep you posted.

I loved it too, it looks very sexy!
And i didn't know its for 360 too, either way its incredibly impressive!

average stalker

11-05-06, 02:13

wow that looks real. maybe i will spend $500-$600 for the ps3. i'm not sure yet because i want to upgrade my computer as well.

Spitfire

11-05-06, 02:25

It's definintly worth it from the look and background behind who is developing it.

BTW updated 1st post with Better info and Screenshots

oocladableeblah

11-05-06, 02:52

holy crap those are good

Spitfire

11-05-06, 02:57

glad you like, it's probably the most impressive one i've seen beside FF13, but this has more realism to it, it's just overly impressive!

Apofiss

11-05-06, 03:29

Face skin detail/animation looks impressive!!! O.O

Jin Uzuki

11-05-06, 03:31

Indigo Prophecy is highly addictive! It's movie-themed gameplay hooked me to my console for hours straight. Heavy Rain, I'm confident will do the same...or even better! And those screenshots is but a single proof of why this latest effort from Quantic Dream will hold me stunned. ;) Thanks, Spitfire. :wve:

Spitfire

11-05-06, 03:44

Glad i could contribute, will keep posting collected materials and posting em here of impressive games!

Zip

11-05-06, 07:33

It looks visially impressive and well i cant wait,i want it now

Shark_Blade

11-05-06, 12:10

It looks like 98% realistic!

Jin Uzuki

11-05-06, 12:14

It looks like 98% realistic!
I wonder what game would achieve a hundred percent. :) That's soon to come, I believe. :wve:

Spitfire

11-05-06, 13:00

I wonder what game would achieve a hundred percent. :) That's soon to come, I believe. :wve:

not that soon, not even CG scenes look 100% realistic, what makes them so special is the dynanic effects like lighting and incredible animation, I don't think games will be able to cary the same feel as CG movies simply because it's not going to have the same perspectives and angles and completely custom animations like the CG movies

Now some games are looking mighty fine with some of the best character animations to date and starting to include those CG movie effects like Dynamic Lighting and the Dynamic Clothes and Hair effects with full physics implimented. We are getting way better than before but i dont think we will get to the "it looks 100% real" for awhile.

Spitfire

11-05-06, 13:11

UPDATE!!
Movie Trailer is Online, i posted it up in the 1st post

Shark_Blade

11-05-06, 14:45

I wonder what game would achieve a hundred percent. :) That's soon to come, I believe. :wve:
I believe so too. Maybe in 5 years time on PS4,etc?:D